


Making a House a Home

by SapphoIsBurning



Category: Professional Wrestling, World Wrestling Entertainment
Genre: Alternate Universe - Domestic, Christmas Fluff, House Hunting, M/M, Mpreg
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-18
Updated: 2017-12-18
Packaged: 2019-02-16 12:57:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13054470
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SapphoIsBurning/pseuds/SapphoIsBurning
Summary: Rhyno and Heath Slater go shopping for houses and can only seem to find nightmares, until someone’s dream comes true.





	Making a House a Home

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ThatBohoFemme](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThatBohoFemme/gifts).



> Merry Christmas, ThatBohoFemme! For the prompt: Heath Slater and Rhyno go house hunting and end up with a string of nightmare houses (see: http://uproxx.com/webculture/creepy-zillow-listing/ and https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/130-S-Birchwood-Ave-Davenport-IA-52802/76846171_zpid/ for my inspiration).

“What is that plywood covering?” Heath asked, puzzled. He walked into the master bedroom of the house and contemplated the strange decor.

“It’s technically oriented strand board,” Rhyno said.

“I think it's decorative,” Alexa Bliss, their real estate agent, said, looking down at her clipboard. “This house has a lot of special modifications made by the previous owners.”

Rhyno grimaced and looked up, down, and all around himself. “Is that the master bathroom?”

“Yes,” Alexa said, squinting at some notes.

Rhyno pulled the sliding door back to reveal a bare toilet and shower stall standing free in what looked like a crawl space. The ceiling was exposed beams and heating ducts, festively decorated with tinsel for the holidays.

Heath put a hand on Rhyno's arm. “Are bathrooms supposed to look like that in fancy houses?” he asked.

“No,” Rhyno said firmly. “This is a real piece of work.”

“It is well within your budget, and I think a handy couple like yourselves could really give this place some TLC,” Alexa said.

“I think I've seen enough,” Rhyno said.

“This is the sixth house,” Heath said forlornly. “Alexa, I thought you all at the house buyin' office said that it was a buyer's market.”

“I really believe it still is,” Alexa said. “Buyers who have some...flexibility in their requirements tend to do the best, of course.”

“Of course,” Rhyno said, frowning. Heath sat down hard on the tidily made bed in the nightmarish bedroom, losing his balance immediately on the sloshing surface.

“Please tell me the place doesn't come with the water bed,” Rhyno said.

“You know, I think it does, I can check!” Alexa said.

Rhyno held out a hand to help Heath back up.

“No, let me rest here a minute,” Heath said.”I've been so tired lately. Must be the short days, they just get to me, you know? And I got that thin southern blood.”

“That's not a thing,” Rhyno said, but he smiled at his husband lying sprawled on the water bed, carried back and forth by the sloshing water.

“The next home on our list is just down the street,” Alexa said.”I think this one's a real gem.”

***

Turns out, down the road mean down a very long dead-end road and up a hill.

Alexa maneuvered her Ford Explorer up the driveway and into park in front of an angular home with a gingerbread porch and at least one broken window.

“It's a three bedroom, two bath fixer-upper with a lot of potential,” she said.

“Why do you keep showin' us ones that need fixin'?” Heath asked. "Do I look like a guy who likes to hang his own drywall?"

“Kinda, yeah,” Rhyno said, looking over his shoulder at Heath in the backseat with a grin. “And I look like a guy who knows a lot about grout. Because I do.”

Heath pouted. He folded his arms.

Rhyno got out of the car and opened the door for Heath, holding out an arm to help him down.

“You don't gotta do that, I can get out of a damn car,” Heath said.

“You weren't looking so steady earlier, and it’s icy,” Rhyno said. "Let me be a gentleman."

"You're so damn husbandly," Heath said, smiling despite himself.

They crunched through a layer of snow up a brick pathway to a red front door, which Alexa unlocked. “Kurt told me he was sure this would be a great fit for you,” she said.

They went inside to a dusty, empty living room with a fireplace. The room smelled faintly of jasmine.

As they walked in, they could see where the furniture used to be from tracks in the dust and marks on the hardwood floor. Alexa turned on lights as she went, showing off a 1950’s kitchen and leading them into a back mud room. The jasmine smell got stronger as they went.

“Who’s burning smelly candles in a damn empty house?” Heath said, covering his mouth and nose with the neck of his tee shirt and tried not to gag.

They took the stairs to look at the bedrooms upstairs. The master bathroom was missing its mirror, and the mirrored closet doors were ripped off their hinges or just missing from the bedrooms.

“There's a little note on this documentation," Alexa said. "House has upstairs apartment that...has been leased. Buyer must maintain lease and not disturb tenant. Tenant does not pay rent. Cannot be evicted. See attached paperwork…” She trailed off. “Oh come on.”

“Alexa. Stop showing us crazy murder houses,” Heath said. “I can't take it anymore.”

“Heath,” Rhyno said, putting a hand on his back.

“No really, I mean--that smell--” Heath said, but then he ran to the open door of the upstairs bathroom and vomited in the toilet.

“Shh, baby, it’s okay, we don’t have to look at any more houses today,” Rhyno said, rubbing Heath’s back gently.

“So I’ll take that as a no,” Alexa muttered, making a note on her clipboard.

***

Heath felt mostly better after they got home, but he found himself feeling sick again first thing the next morning, and still tired to boot. Rhyno made him call in to work before kissing him goodbye and tucking him back into bed.

The holidays were stressful enough, but their lease was up soon and Heath had been so set on finding a new place for the new year. A fresh start, not a dingy rental with a broken dishwasher and loud upstairs neighbors.

He tried to let himself sleep, but it got boring. He browsed house listings on his tablet with the scratched screen and tried to figure out how to bookmark the ones he liked.

He went into the kitchen and horked down a multivitamin and cut up a bunch of broccoli for dinner, along with the pork chops he thawed from their apartment freezer.

Something nagged at him, though. While the meat was thawing on the counter, he ran to the drugstore, trying not to panic. He didn’t have a lot of time to panic before Rhyno got home from the plant.

***

“Hey babe,” Rhyno said shouldering the door open. “I got you something.”

“Eh?” Heath said. He was sitting on the couch wrapped in a crocheted afghan, drinking a room-temperature Diet Pepsi. Their artificial christmas tree blinked on and off, green, red, blue.

“It’s a Christmas present but after yesterday, I thought you might like to have it early,” he went on. He handed Heath a small package wrapped in red foil paper.

“Oh,” Heath said. He pulled at the ribbon and slid a finger under the taped, folded corners, like he always had, even when he wasn’t so broke he had to save paper and reuse it. He pulled the paper away.

“I bought you a house,” Rhyno said, his brows coming together in trepidation. “Do you like it?”

Heath turned the little box over in his hands: a christmas ornament of a snow-covered cottage, lights aglow, two figures in silhouette in the front window.

“It’s real pretty, it’ll go great on the tree,” Heath said. “I’d move into this one if they’d let me.”

“Might be a little cramped,” Rhyno said. He shucked off his coat and sat down on the couch next to Heath.

“We could downsize. Well. Or not. Hey I got something for you too,” Heath said. He grabbed something off the side table and handed it to Rhyno.

It was a plastic pregnancy test strip, showing a blue plus sign. Positive.

For a moment, Rhyno just stared at the test, processing. The silence made Heath nervous, so he talked.

“It wasn't going to be a christmas present, Rhyno, I swear, I got you a sweater and some of those little fancy chocolates you like, but I thought about why I was throwing up and I went and bought a test, and it just happened and I don't know what to do…” Heath hiccuped himself into a sob.

Rhyno dropped the test stick and pulled Heath into his arms. “Dear heart. Honey bun. Heath, oh I'm so happy, I never thought I would be so lucky before I met you.”

Heath hiccuped again. “But what do we *do*? We don’t have room for a baby here.”

“I’ve got a line on a new realtor,” Rhyno said. “No more murder houses. Only cozy cottages for you and for my baby,” he said, beaming. “For our happily ever after.”

 


End file.
